4-Story Rubber Duckie to Make U.S. Debut

The giant rubber duckie will appear in Pittsburgh on Friday

A 4-story rubber duckie will make its first U.S. appearance in Pittsburgh on Friday.

A giant rubber duckie has appeared at events in Hong Kong to Sao Paulo over the last few years, but this is the first time that there has been an American version of the duck. The rubber duckies are built based off of designs by Florentijn Hofman, a Dutch artist. Hofman claims that the duck has healing powers due to its lack of discrimination and political alignment. The duck has taken months to assemble and requires 14,000-pound pontoons to keep it afloat. Officials had to alert the Coast Guard and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers about the duck due to the heavy traffic in the Ohio River. The arrival of the duck at Pittsburgh will start a festival that will include: theater, dance, music and visual arts from around the world, reports The Washington Post.

“It’s a serious piece of art,” Paul Organisak, the man responsible for bring the duck to Pittsburgh, told The Pittsburgh Post Gazette. “When people are seeing it they are engaging and coming together. It’s about connecting the planet in a very global way.”